Ray Ban

From single-handedly sustaining the pot-noodle industry to eating said noodles daily with chopsticks made of Windsor & Newton watercolour brushes (numbers 00 and 0 are best for grip and precision) on account of leaning tower of pizza boxes and various unwashed crockery, I have lived the ‘uni life’. Thoroughly, might I add. This very site – now my livelihood – was in fact a love child between Chronic Procrastination (who may be the love of my life) and myself, thick into second year of my BA course. Which, just like the tuft of window moss I passionately nursed right around the same time, or learning how to knit, were anything BUT conducive to my higher education. The common denominator for all this being: deadlines.

…for we all remember the penny-pinching days of living exclusively on instant noodles and PB (J too if lucky) sandwiches.

By the time my graduation show rolled by, all I had to show for the four years was a crude, ill-executed prototype of – to my defence – a grand concept that was meant to get me a D&AD award, if not an Oscar, with a side of Would sir like to see my hand-knitted SpongeBob, or a DIY moss garden, OR MAYBE MY FASHION BLOG? Of course, no amount of grovelling and showing off of various love-children would win me a job. So, hats off to Genevieve Devine of Northumbria University who was awarded the 25th Anniversary Sainsbury’s Tu Scholarship Award and a rare opportunity to start the relationship with the public through an accessible collection backed by a strong patron.

Here’s first glimpse of the Tu x Graduate Fashion Week collection (already in stores), comprised of historical workwear* silhouettes in natural fibres and punctuated by sweet embroidery details that hint at a carefree summer days and simpler times when I could coast by, dodging deadlines and knitting the crap out of things.

Black Vase – West Elm.

art direction & photography SHINI PARK in collaboration with YOUR MUM

What I’m doing in this flat is quite possibly in violation of some renters’ law: the comprehensive yet unspoken/unwritten set of rules that is policed by no one but adhered to by everyone who is under a tenancy agreement of sorts. You homeowners can go outside and play, this post does not apply to you… superior humans.
Picture frames all aligned at the same base-line (the floor), make-shift storage space under the stairs/behind the IKEA EKBY, free-standing clothes-hangers that buckle under sale purchases… yeah, you know exactly what I’m talking about. We do not invest in big furniture, and when we do it’s made of cardboard (or breadcrumbs?), comes flat-packed and you probably transported it home in a bus yourself. Built-in storage is literally my wet dream. Maybe not literally.

Also, what is a drill, pray tell?

If it helps to further understand, these laws are accompanied by an Amazon recommended-product list full of sticker-back wall hooks and cheap draught prevention kits BECAUSE YOUR LANDLADY DOESN’T BELIEVE IN CURTAINS, so you spend the balls-cold weekend sealing off the windows with a combination of bargain-store fabric and clear plastic, and hope for the best. Doesn’t hide the fact that now your overpriced London flat looks like a blanket fort that Troy & Abed would approve of.

So me taking a measuring tape to the walls, is in clear violation of the above. A MEASURING TAPE, you guys. Then proceeding to ordering furniture that perfectly slide into the little indent in the wall next to the fireplace. We’ve even bought a drill, and have plans of making fist-sized holes into the walls come weekend; you know, for fun. My logic is this: Live a little. Why pay such a ridiculous amount to live in a relatively attractive, albeit ill-heated space and then further offend it by not making it a home? Because stupid, that’s what. Rant over. Here are some corners I’ve been refreshing in the last couple of weeks between the bliss that was my horizontal-and-TV adventures.